I don't know what to think about LA Noire.

LA Noire is very cool and very interesting, but it is neither fun or engaging. I bought a week ago for 40 bucks, because I'm incredibly bored. I'm very very close to the end of the game now, but I haven't beaten it yet. The charm of the game has been lost on me after going into Arson. I didn't like the turn in the story at all. The high point in the game for me is homicide because I didn't like Galloway at all, but then he really grew on me. Something clicked and I was like "come on pal lets go solve some murders. adventure time go!" Vice was interesting but the story took a nose dive after that. Cole's life is basically ruined and everyone hates him, no more adventure time. I'm not finding the arson cases that interesting and they aren't really that original. I don't know what to think, I really enjoyed the first half, but not the 2nd half at all.

I found that once the novelty of the face animations and setting wore off Noire was just a pretty boring adventure game. It seems that people who liked the story enjoyed the second half of the game more.

And even that was hard, since Cole is not really a likable character and the way he gets demoted to arson is done in such an offhand way it's just dumb and lazy.

Since you don't have an opinion and cannot correctly formulate one, I will do the job for you.

LA Noire is awesome. Rusty Galloway aka Finbar is a fat, cynical waste of a man and that's why you like him. His pessimism and general hatred of the world makes you realise why your life ain't too bad.

The detecting is engaging without being tedious. It truly allows an interactivity to an aspect of videogames which would usually be covered by cutscenes. The interactivity being the focus of the gameplay, allows the player to truly explore and view the game world from a perspective which until now they've mostly been denied. LA Noire attempts and mostly succeeds in crafting a story of violence and conflict without needing to resort to violence at the first opportunity. It does not descend into juvenility and tries to eschew the interactive relationship of player and character through violence alone. In this regard it succeeds in not being an interactively dysfunctional game, i.e. one where the sole means of interaction is violence alone regardless of the situation. It is making you think not just in puzzle terms, which games excel at, but deeply question your own awareness and judgment abilities. It makes you question yourself.

Now by no means does it wholly succeed. The interrogation sequences are still too scripted, channeling you constantly down a few paths, some of which are redundant. It still forces you to pull a gun, granted the character is a cop, but the mechanics don't quite hold up. There are technical issues, which are mostly minor but irritating. And the ending doesn't fully feel realised. Not only in the fact that the other characters shoes you are put in, you barely feel attached to at such a late stage of the game, but the ending itself feels hollow, dare I say it, a cop out (ho ho pun intended).

FROM NOW ON, THIS IS YOUR OPINION. YOU SHALL HAVE NO OTHER OPINION AND ANYONE THAT DISAGREES WITH THIS IS JUST WRONG. IGNORE THEM.

The Arson department really is just complete ass. The game was at its best when it was primarily you going through self-contained stories, and Arson with its high-speed departure into throwing you right into the overarching story, which was slowly peddling before hand making the leap all the more irksome, felt incredibly off-kilter and shoddy.

The gameplay was an entertaining gimmick for a while, but even that eventually succumbed to tedium and the overt simplicity of everything shined threw once the mystique of the facial tech melted away. I've still got two DLC cases I've downloaded through the R* Pass that I haven't played, and honestly may never at this point. It's one of those games that firmly keeps your first impression of amazement stuck on your face just long enough to not notice how boring the game can actually be.

That's not to say I didn't enjoy a lot of my time with it; the mini stories within the cases were pretty great, the voice acting was brilliant and introduced a lot of memorable characters. It's just the gameplay part that has rapidly aged already to becoming nigh playable for me.

Well said, sir. I recently finished the game and felt largely the same way. It gets better towards the very end, but yeah, it starts to become a grind as you're coming into Arson. A bit of a disappointing game considering I paid full price for it. I almost never do that.

I did the exact same thing as the OP. I stopped playing while doing the missions as Jack Kelso or whoever. The highpoint of the game for me was working homicide and the over arching story that existed there. This whole Elysian Fields bull shit though I just don't find that interesting.

I was really into it in the beginning though. I think the game might have too many cases, especially with the DLC included. After the first 10 or so missions it's like you've seen everything the game has to offer and the rest of the game is just more of the same. I'll probably finish it eventually, but probably just so I can say I did and get a few achievements out of it.

Since you don't have an opinion and cannot correctly formulate one, I will do the job for you.

LA Noire is awesome. Rusty Galloway aka Finbar is a fat, cynical waste of a man and that's why you like him. His pessimism and general hatred of the world makes you realise why your life ain't too bad.

The detecting is engaging without being tedious. It truly allows an interactivity to an aspect of videogames which would usually be covered by cutscenes. The interactivity being the focus of the gameplay, allows the player to truly explore and view the game world from a perspective which until now they've mostly been denied. LA Noire attempts and mostly succeeds in crafting a story of violence and conflict without needing to resort to violence at the first opportunity. It does not descend into juvenility and tries to eschew the interactive relationship of player and character through violence alone. In this regard it succeeds in not being an interactively dysfunctional game, i.e. one where the sole means of interaction is violence alone regardless of the situation. It is making you think not just in puzzle terms, which games excel at, but deeply question your own awareness and judgment abilities. It makes you question yourself.

Now by no means does it wholly succeed. The interrogation sequences are still too scripted, channeling you constantly down a few paths, some of which are redundant. It still forces you to pull a gun, granted the character is a cop, but the mechanics don't quite hold up. There are technical issues, which are mostly minor but irritating. And the ending doesn't fully feel realised. Not only in the fact that the other characters shoes you are put in, you barely feel attached to at such a late stage of the game, but the ending itself feels hollow, dare I say it, a cop out (ho ho pun intended).

FROM NOW ON, THIS IS YOUR OPINION. YOU SHALL HAVE NO OTHER OPINION AND ANYONE THAT DISAGREES WITH THIS IS JUST WRONG. IGNORE THEM.

HEY PAL I HAVE AN OPINION TOO... and it's exactly the same as yours....

It's kind of embarassing but you've summed it up in such a concise and reasonable way, I just have to agree with everything you said.

I loved it initially, but right around the end of homicide began to fall sharply out of love with it. Pushed myself through vice taking even longer breaks than usual. Made it to arson, put it on the shelf and havent touched it since.

I think it was a mixture of no part in that game being fun to play in any way shape or form whatsoever, and how retarded the story got towards the end - but a youtubing to the end confirmed my beliefes as to where the story was going and i don't feel i've missed ot much in not finishing the final third,

It was a fun ride, but you sum it up pretty well. I still enjoyed the arson cases, but no nearly as much as everything before it. Wait until you beat the game, the ending left me with the biggest feeling of disappointment then any other game.